


Metamorphosis

by droukhunter



Series: Tears in the Rain [1]
Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Castellan conditioning, Castellan restraints, F/M, Gen, Loss of Bodily Autonomy, Unbeta'd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-17 10:13:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20619329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/droukhunter/pseuds/droukhunter
Summary: "It was that...that phrase. That was his "Berserk Button", a phrase that if used at any time, in any place, could cause him to lose control of himself. And it terrified him." Also known as: Lacro Roscini, the former Cipher Five, hates moth and butterfly puberty.





	Metamorphosis

Lacro didn’t like reading up on insects much, even though Dozh was fascinated by everything biology had to offer (but mostly insects, to be honest). They were (especially butterflies and moths) unpleasant to look at, what with the incredibly large, beady eyes and the oddly-shaped bodies. The only thing about them (to Lacro, at least) that was actually beautiful were their wings. He was partial to the wings of most moth species, for the patterns on them reminded him of Dozh’s cultural tattoos. To be honest, the facial tattoos she had gotten when she came of age as an adult Zabrak looked like moth wings to him.

That said, he was reading up on moon moths, as Dozh had said to him: “They’re mysterious, have powder-blue skin, and red eyes. Remind you of anyone?”

Thinking about the joke she had made caused him to roll his eyes again, as he had done when she’d said that. Not that she’d ever know, given the way Chiss eyes worked. Most of this holobook on the species had been rather enlightening, until he got past moon moth reproduction and into..._ metamorphosis… _

_ Keeper was speaking to him privately in his office, after his first successful infiltration and manipulation mission. “Agent Lacroi Roscini, you are no longer who you once were; now, you are Cipher Five. Your previous affiliations, names, and aliases, as far as Intelligence and anyone else in the galaxy is concerned, including you, no longer exist. They are dead now until you take on another alias for any future missions.” _

_ The next five years blurred past him as he made more successful infiltrations to secure the allegiances of several organizations, planetary governments, and even a few powerful sections of the Hutt Cartel to the Empire and wore more and more cover identities like masks over the real Lacro Roscini, who was supposed to be dead and not exist--except he did. He always did. _

_ Most Cipher agents didn’t make it to five years as a Cipher. He laughed bitterly at how he had lasted exactly five years, the same number as his designation, before someone in Intelligence had tipped off an enemy of his to try to discard the organization of him while on his last mission for the benefit of the Empire (not that he had known it would be his last at the time, but he thanked the stars every day that it was; _ k’pah _ , he never wanted to work for the Empire ever again, much less Imperial Intelligence). His “crime?” Running into a Jedi padawan (Dozh Sey, now his girlfriend, but at the time, simply a Jedi padawan finishing her Trials) on Darvannis and allowing her to speak to him, while he continued to maintain his cover as a Mandalorian named “Jorma Sharratt.” Though they had somehow become friendly and Dozh was getting borderline flirty with him, despite both Dozh and her Cerean Master, Twen Mere-So, seeming to know full well what he was in actuality. _

_ And _ that _ \--besides being a noticeably fake Mandalorian on Darvannis, sneaking around corridors with his hand near his holdout blaster at every corner he was given, and being just a little too agreeable and flirty in that dirty-arse cantina towards his _ actually _ Mandalorian mark--had probably broken his cover, but he didn’t know for sure; how frustrating, how irritating, how...terrifying, that there were phantom sounds of footsteps that were not his own behind him everywhere he walked. _

_ Once the phrase was spoken, he’d lost complete control of his voice, his body, his actions. As though he were a literal puppet. _

_ “Codeword: Metamorphosis. Put that blaster of yours to the Zabrak girl’s head, and pull the trigger.” _

_ Maybe there was more to this than Intelligence was letting on; in fact, there was _ definitely _ more to this than Intelligence was letting on. _

_ That said, he wished he could will his body to do _ anything _ besides what it was doing, but there proved to be no use in struggling against whatever was affecting him. (At least he could think his own thoughts right now, he supposed. Except that made him feel more nauseous with anxiety over his situation at the moment.) He was lucky that Master Mere-So pushed the blaster out of Lacro’s hands with the Force. That Dozh had stood defiant, lightsaber ignited and facing forward, against an enemy he’d made undercover (he recognized the Houk from a mission that had Lacro playing the role of a member of the Black Sun...and then destroying a solid number of their shipments while escaping, as was intended) that had found out about this...codeword. And that, after everything had come to pass and was over, both she and Dozh had forgiven him for something he didn’t even know had been done to him--or the logic behind doing something like that, when all he’d done was remain loyal to the Empire. _

_ Or at least, until then. Almost immediately afterwards, he asked for help defecting to the Republc (despite the inevitable scrutiny he’d face, given his species and his history), and life had been calmer and more peaceful--and with a lot fewer deaths on his conscience (besides the ones that had already been killed in the name of the Empire or of surviving another day). There had been no utterance or even written mention of the codeword that had taken away his ability to control his body for _ years _ ... _

...until now. Lacro’s usual cold, yet calm, demeanor had been eclipsed by an overwhelming fury at his past--Imperial Intelligence, the entire Sith Empire, the Sith themselves, all the enemies he’d been forced to make to get the job done as a Cipher agent, but most of all, the Aristocra of House Inrokini--that asshat Hazaar’isk’inrokini--for sending him from his rather nice job with the Chiss secret police to Imperial Intelligence so Lacro would be exiled for having done _ absolutely nothing wrong _ except look at and speak to Aristocra Riskin in a way that wasn’t much appreciated by the pompous _ bircisb _ . And at whatever the Empire (it was probably the Empire, but who did it and what the thing was, he had no clue) did to him that made a single word referring to the stages of growth _ for insects _ able to control everything he did or said, while he could do nothing but observe as the metaphorical strings pulled on him to do someone else’s bidding.

Lacro chucked the holobook out the open window in his and Dozh’s apartment on Coruscant with as much arm strength as he could muster. For a split second, he hoped that nobody below the apartment got killed by the holobook, but just as quickly pushed it out of his mind and went back to the kitchen to clean the dishes. How nice to be able to choose what you do with your own hands.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a one-shot that will likely become part of a side fic for **Echoes**-verse that I'm working on. The whole thing is still being outlined at this time (and it ends around the time Chapter 1 of _Ghosts_ begins, for the record). For now, it's a drabble based off of a prompt I received from a Discord server I'm in that had a longer version of the quote in the summary, also known as the "berserk button" prompt.
> 
> Thank you Asherren for the prompt!
> 
> There are two Cheunh words in the chapter: the first one, k'pah, translates approximately to "shit," and bircisb to "bastard." Look, Lacro is still working through some shit right now.


End file.
